Russia FM: Kurds may be engaged on the ground for closing Syria’s border with Turkey

December 03, 2015, 8:43 UTC+3BELGRADEThe Russian diplomat suggested that "Kurds’ efforts - respectively on Syria’s border and Iraq’s border - could be joined with efforts of Turkey’s government alongside US special reactions teams"

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BELGRADE, December 3. /TASS/. Kurds and US army special reaction teams may be engaged on the ground to close Syria’s border with Turkey, but only with the consent of Damascus, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said after talks with his Serbian counterpart Ivica Dacic, the current Chair of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

"As for concrete ways aimed at closing Turkey’s border with Syria and Iraq as well, we should proceed from concrete possibilities on the ground," Lavrov said. "Kurds’ militias, allies of the US-led coalition, could be engaged both from the Syrian and Iraqi sides. The US has a special reaction team in Iraq. Washington has said that it might be also used in Syria. I am convinced that it should be done only with Damascus’s consent but there exist special reaction teams on the ground."

The Russian foreign minister suggested that "Kurds’ efforts - respectively on Syria’s border and Iraq’s border - could be joined with efforts of Turkey’s government alongside US special reactions teams, with possible participation of other coalition members, on the Turkish side of the border with Syria and Iraq."

"Given terrorists will hamper creation of these barriers on the way to replenishing the ISIL (former name of the Islamic State terrorist group outlawed in Russia), I am sure Russia’s air group in Syria jointly with the US-led coalition forces can and will be ready to provide support in the air so that the terrorists would not interfere when the border will be closed both ways - for illegal supplies of crude oil and reverse flows of weapons and militants," he said.